We have great news in Moneygall! A visitor centre named after President Obama, which will focus on his ancestry, will open in two weeks’ time.

It will serve as a welcoming point into the ancestral home of the President and will tell the story of his Irish Ancestry and of that historic trip to Moneygall on 05/23/11 (3 years this Friday).

We will also highlight the other 21 American Presidents with Irish ancestry and many more famous Irish Americans. It will be an Oasis on the M7 Motorway, only 1.5 hours from Dublin.

This centre will be free to visit and I have been tasked with getting memorabilia for the area.

I was wondering if any of The Obama Diary’s followers would like to send us anything connected with President Obama, his 1st election, inauguration and the subsequent election and inauguration, that we could put on display in the centre?

If people are willing to share badges, bumper stickers, newspapers, election posters, etc, we would be delighted.

We understand people would like to keep these items, but maybe if they had duplicates – eg two copies of the same newspaper or magazine – they might consider sending them to me.

(Note from Chips: Anyone who would like to send items to Henry, just email me at TheObamaDiary@gmail.com and I will give you his address)

We want this to be an exciting location with lots for people to see, so hopefully the dedicated The Obama Diary contributors and followers can send something to us for our exhibitions – and when you visit Moneygall, we will ensure you all receive the warmest of welcomes!

I got to meet with the President yesterday and I wanted to share with you this drawing that I presented him with. It’s a pencil drawing of the president in front of his ancestral home and the White House. It was by Brian Fogarty a school teacher from Co Tipperary now living in Galway.

Kind Regards,

Henry Healy

Thank you Henry – love that drawing, it’s beautiful.

(I asked Henry if his head hurt today, he said “it’s coming ’round” – so, good news!)

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Next up:

2:05 PM EDT President Obama and PM Netanyahu Hold a Press Conference

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CNN and CBS are showing a lot of live streaming from Israel today, so keep checking in

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ENORMOUS thanks to LovelyPlains for this morning’s Rise and Shine – it was just ** magnificent **

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Will be back a little later with photos and videos from Israel, just getting some work done – see ya then.

President Obama talks with PM Tusk of Poland in the private residence of the White House, Sept. 17, 2009. NSC Chief of Staff Denis McDonough is in the background (Photo by Pete Souza)

Washington Post: President Obama will name deputy national security adviser Denis McDonough, a longtime trusted aide, as his new White House chief of staff Friday, officials said.

McDonough, 43, has spent the past two years as the No. 2 official in the National Security Council, helping guide some of the administration’s most high-profile decisions, including the military drawdowns in Iraq and Afghanistan, the response to earthquakes in Haiti and Japan and the aftermath of the terror attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya last fall.

Obama considers McDonough one of his “closest and most trusted advisors for nearly a decade,” a White House official said.

GOPolitico: The White House will also announce several other promotions Friday, including moving communications director Dan Pfeiffer to the job of senior adviser, and shifting deputy communications director Jennifer Palmieri into Pfeiffer’s old job. Pfeiffer’s move comes as David Plouffe, a longtime Obama political adviser, plans to leave the White House this month.

Other senior-level moves include:

Rob Nabors – Assistant to the President and Deputy White House Chief of Staff for Policy
Tony Blinken – Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor
Danielle Gray – Assistant to the President and Cabinet Secretary
Katy Kale – Assistant to the President for Management and Administration
Lisa Monaco – Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism (upon confirmation of John Brennan as DCIA)
Miguel Rodriguez –Assistant to the President and Director of Legislative Affairs
David Simas – Assistant to the President and Deputy Senior Advisor for Communications and Strategy

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President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will give a joint interview at the White House on Friday afternoon to CBS News’ Steve Kroft, for broadcast Sunday on “60 Minutes.”

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Steve Benen: We don’t yet know exactly why Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) gave up on ambitious reforms of filibuster rules. After months of voicing support for sweeping changes, it’s possible Reid just didn’t have the votes from his own caucus to pursue bold reforms through the “constitutional option.”

Whatever the reasoning, however, it’s important that folks understand that when Reid says protecting the filibuster is necessary to keep the Senate from being like the House, he’s wrong…..

Greg Sargent: Now that the smoke has cleared from the wreckage of yesterday’s filibuster reform debacle, what’s next for those who want to fix our broken Senate? There is no denying that yesterday’s outcome was a terrible disappoint for those who still hold out hope for functional government. At the same time, there are some silver linings…..

NYT: The White House has decided to circumvent Capitol Hill as it concentrates its gun-control efforts on speeches and other public appearances by President Obama and Vice President Biden outside of Washington, according to officials with knowledge of the plans.

With Obama’s gun agenda dependent on centrist Democratic senators who are nervous about their reelection prospects, the administration has calculated that the president is better off helping to build a groundswell of popular support within the lawmakers’ states rather than negotiating directly with them, officials said.

NYT: The White House delivered a strong message to Wall Street on Thursday, taking the unusual step of choosing two former prosecutors as top financial regulators.

But translating that message into action will not be easy, given the complexities of the market and Wall Street’s aggressive nature.

At a short White House ceremony, President Obama named Mary Jo White, the first female United States attorney in Manhattan, to run the Securities and Exchange Commission. Mr. Obama also renominated Richard Cordray as the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a position he has held for the last year under a temporary recess appointment without Senate approval.

With the appointments, the president showed a renewed resolve to hold Wall Street accountable for wrongdoing, extolling his candidates’ records as prosecutors.

President Obama greets a local resident on Main Street in Moneygall, Ireland, May 23, 2011 (Photo by Pete Souza)

Irish Examiner: The US President is to be immortalised in the birthplace of his ancestors with the Barack Obama Plaza in Moneygall, Co Offaly.

Around €6m is being invested in the plaza by Supermac’s founder Pat McDonagh, to commemorate the visit by the President and his wife Michelle in 2011.

It will also see the establishment of the Barack Obama Community Facility, where exhibitions of historic and current material marking the relationship between Moneygall and the United States will go on display.

This is the single biggest investment on the Offaly/Tipperary border region in decades and will bring 60 new jobs to the area, as well as 75 jobs during the construction phase.